Microchipping of Alzheimer's patients begins in Florida
Pastor Dale Morgan
Microchipping of Alzheimer's patients begins in Florida*
Friday, September 14, 2007 by: David Gutierrez
(NewsTarget) The Delray Beach, Fla.-based company VeriChip Corp. has
announced plans to implant 200 Alzheimer's patients in Palm Beach County
with radio-frequency identification chips as part of a pilot study to
test the new technology.
The VeriMed microchip is approximately the size of a grain of rice and
contains a 16-digit patient identification number, which is available to
anyone who scans the device with the right technology. This number can
then be entered into a database to retrieve a patient's medical
information. The FDA has approved the chip for human implantation.
According to VeriChip's CEO Scott Silverman, the VeriMed chip will
eventually provide peace of mind to the families of Alzheimer's patients
by providing a safety net in case a patient should get lost.
"When an Alzheimer's patient gets lost, once their arm is scanned, it
would identify who they are and that they are an Alzheimer's patient,"
Silverman said.
The chip is not a GPS device, Silverman emphasized, and cannot be used
to track people in whom it is implanted. All the participants in the
two-year study are volunteers, and Silverman expressed pleasure with the
study's reception so far.
"We had an excellent turn-out at the educational seminars and virtually
100% enrollment," he said. "This overwhelming acceptance underscores the
value of the VeriMed system not only for Alzheimer's patients, but their
caregivers as well."
But privacy and patients' rights advocates have criticized the project,
charging that it strips Alzheimer's patients of their dignity.
The organization Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and
Numbering (CASPIAN), owner of the web sites spychips.com and
antichips.com, has accused VeriChip of testing a potentially unsafe
technology on the "most vulnerable" segment of the population,
questioning whether Alzheimer's patients are truly capable of giving
their consent to be involved in such a study. CASPIAN has warned that
the chips may cause adverse tissue reactions, problems with medical
devices, electrical hazards and may place patients at risk of having
their private information stolen.
Consumer health advocate Mike Adams added, "These Alzheimer's patients
are being used as guinea pigs as part of a campaign that intends to
eventually microchip the entire population. Today, it's senior citizens,
pets and children... in the near future, it will be everyone."